CHALLENGES, BARRIERS, & SOLUTIONS

 

CHALLENGE:  One of our biggest challenges is scheduling a consistent and ample amount of time weekly for our stand alone component of our CS curriculum.

BARRIER:  A current barrier is the transition time for our 5th and 6th grade classes.  What is scheduled as a 30 minute CS Special becomes a 20 minute class due to student's transitioning and getting all necessary resources needed for class. 

SOLUTION:  To solve our "time" barrier, our administration is working on developing a new schedule that incorporates transition time for our K-6 building.

 

 

CHALLENGE: The physical locations of our computer science instruction does not have ample space to manipulate physical computing devices.

BARRIER:  Currently, we are doing CS instruction within the classrooms and/or lunchroom. 

SOLUTION:   To help mitigate the space issue is to rearrange desks, chairs, and tables every time more space is needed for performance tasks with the physical computing devices. (Drones, Cue and Dash Robots, Bluebots, as well as unplugged activities). 

 

 

CHALLENGE: Our student digital devices (Chromebooks).  Some of our physical computing devices do not work well or at all with our Chromebooks.  We have to rely on some older ipads that are in our system. In grades Pre-K - 4, teachers are active participants in the computer science instruction. 

BARRIER:  We currently have limited options in our digital devices.

SOLUTION:    We were able to take iPads that were phased out of our lower elementary classrooms and use them with some of our physical computing devices like drones and bluebots.

 

 

CHALLENGE:  In grades 5 and 6, the CS classes are run on a Specials Schedule where the classroom teachers are not present in the direct CS instruction.  Therefore, classroom CS integration is going to be a huge challenge because these teachers will not have the background knowledgee needed to make connections to their core content. 

BARRIER:  District Schedule

SOLUTION:   To have the CS special be a push in model rather than a pull out model and provide professional development opportunities for these teachers as well.

​